home security...

uberwolf

though this may be better suited to DIY/gardening thought I might get some more insightful responses here.

In light if a recent break in at home I came up with this fanciful notion that I could take advantage of the house being networked and set up a group of digital video cameras tucked around the house designed to be triggered when the alarm is set off.

Have a central server that simply receives a signal from alarm system and starts recording the output from the various cameras. Ideally the cameras will only power up in response to a prompt from the centre unit. Though I suppose the output could simply be simply flow through a temp memory, until triggered.

Further, seeing as it's a rural outpost and the alarm simply rings parentals and then myself I thought it might be a nice addition if the output of the cameras could be viewable on our phones (perhaps we could even flick through the cameras).

So there's the vague notion. Is it remarkably fanciful or doable. I'm sure the capablities are technologically there - is there anyone out there that could push me in the right direction??

Gurgle

Theres off-the-shelf systems available, which do all that and more.
The name 'quad-cam' is in my head, I have more info in work, I'll post tomorrow.

SouperComputer

might be of use, ive used this gear a bit, good quality and available as a PDA viewer

http://www.geovision.com.tw/english/index.asp

Pongo

I have geovision's set up in work, can access the system remotely via an ip address, and can get still images sent to my mobile either on request, at set times, or on alarm activation. To be honest, the installation and set up of it is a little out of my depth, but it is something i've been thinking about doing at home myself... Would love to know how you get on with it...

edit: Really what you're looking at is a pc with a very large hard drive and a video capture card with as many channels as cameras that you want, then the geovision software, and your cameras and wiring. It seems simple enough in theory anyway!

SouperComputer

Pongo wrote:

edit: Really what you're looking at is a pc with a very large hard drive and a video capture card with as many channels as cameras that you want, then the geovision software, and your cameras and wiring. It seems simple enough in theory anyway!

yea its handy enough. just opening ports on the firewall and locking down the machine is the messy part.

jozi

There's a program called Go1984 that might be of use to you.
You can setup the software to work on motion sensing, so it only records when it detects movement.
I used it in my brothers flat to see who it was coming up during the day and surelly we caught him, he even had a look at the atractive screensaver when he was there.
I dont know if it works with multiple cams, it is possible to remotelly connect to it or via a lan.
Maybe its good for you,

Jozi

uberwolf

good stuff lads - some of that stuff looks spot on - price is the next issue isn't it!!

Pongo

As far as I know decent cameras will set you back approx €300 each, don't know what they're called but you want ones that automatically switch to infra red when it gets dark. Another point is do you want covert, or overt. A lot of people and businesses tend to go for covert cameras, often disguising them as smoke detectors or such, but I've always been of the opinion that cameras should act as a deterrent, i.e. they should be big and in your face... People should know they're being watched and think twice about doing whatever it is you don't want them to do... Obviously this won't suit in some locations, but definitely for outside the house I'd go big and menacing looking!
The pc with video capture card (and a decent amount of ram) and large hard drive will probably set you back, say €1200, after that all you need is the geovision software. All of this is cheaper on line obviously.....
Again, let us know how you get on, wish I could give you more detailed information, but as I said the installation of it ain't really my strong point!

beller b

This may be a little complicated but it works good with any cameras....(The only problem is you need a fixed ip)
You can get a half decent digital recorder for between €600 & €1000, it need to have a network card. Connect the recorder to your network router.The recorders IP can be set just like another pc.Set port forwarding (usuall port 8888) to forward to the recorders address
Set up a vodafone email address (free). set the recorder to email events to that address
When a email arrives at that address you recieve a text message & you can view your recorder from any computer with internet access..It may sound complicated but it works a treat over broadband & you have full control over playback so you can rewind to before the event.